Democrats need to revisit abortion

Published: Tuesday, January 4, 2005 at 6:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Monday, January 3, 2005 at 10:25 p.m.

The aftermath of the presidential election has significantly widened the chasm between the two diverging continents of thought that comprise the American political landscape. The shrill echoes of cultural condescension and class snobbery that have resonated through this vast canyon are beginning to wane.
Liberal elites may now begin to probe the depths of their souls for remedies to the deficiencies of 2004. If Democrats take any lesson from the elections, it should be that clarity and conviction always trump nuance.
Rising from the epicenter of the divide and casting a menacing shadow over American politics is the abortion issue. With President Bush likely to appoint several Supreme Court justices, and subsequent confirmation wars looming on the horizon, Democrats must find a sound and consistent voice on abortion.
Historically considered a political advantage but lacking accompanying electoral success, the pro-choice party line is beginning to show cracks. Take, for example, this passage from the official 2004 Democratic Party platform:
"Because we believe in the privacy and equality of women, we stand proudly for a woman's right to choose, consistent with Roe v. Wade, and regardless of her ability to pay. We stand firmly against Republican efforts to undermine that right. At the same time, we strongly support family planning and adoption incentives. Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare."
Obviously a glib attempt at even-handedness, this particular plank appears to impose abortion upon the populace as an absolute human right to be provided, if need be, at taxpayer expense.
Unlike abortion, the right to bear arms is specifically enumerated in the constitution. Imagine the hysteria if Republicans adopted the equally radical yet perhaps more legally sound position of providing firearms to all citizens regardless of ability to pay.
While their extreme position on abortion is a political vulnerability, the crux of the Democrats' dilemma resides in the final, sound bite-friendly sentence: namely, why should the safe and legal exercise of an absolute human right occur only rarely?
Rationalizing this paradox, until recently, required little more than centrist-sounding lip service from Democrats.
The popular Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 gave liberals the opportunity to realize their purported desire to rarify the more than 1 million annual abortions in the United States with little accompanying political risk. Yet Senate Democrats opposed the ban 30-17. Among those voting against the ban was the top of the 2004 presidential ticket, Sen. John Kerry.
Kerry, perhaps, best personifies the difficulty abortion presents for Democrats. Never one to abandon any side of an issue, Kerry suffered irreparable harm fromby his abortion positions. ABC News anchor Peter Jennings asked Kerry in July to square his moral opposition to abortion, coupled with his belief that life begins at conception, with his policy positions.
Jennings: "If you believe that life begins at conception, is even a first-trimester abortion not murder?"
Kerry: "No, because it's not the form of life that takes personhood in the terms that we have judged it to be in the past. It's the beginning of life."
Kerry claimed to be a man of science. Yet, standing firmly on the party platform, he was reduced to amateur theorizing about the infusion of "personhood" into what he admits can only reasonably be human life. Merriam-Webster defines life as "an organismic state characterized by capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction."
Only in the politicized biological classification of the products of human conception does controversy exist in distinguishing between the living and the inanimate.
Diminishing in power since 2000, Democrats now stand at a crossroads. A CBS News poll conducted at their national convention found that delegates were twice as likely as Democratic voters to support abortion in all cases. Nevertheless, abortion extremists within the party leadership want no limits on the practice and have since 1973 gradually steered the party to the furthest leftward reaches of the political spectrum.
Faced with the consolidation of Republican power, Democrats must now either defend the position that abortion is of no more moral significance than an appendectomy and yet among the most fundamental of human rights, or move immediately to assist in reducing its occurrence.
The choice belongs to them.
Matthew Hicks, a registered nurse and father of four, lives and works in Gainesville.

The aftermath of the presidential election has significantly widened the chasm between the two diverging continents of thought that comprise the American political landscape. The shrill echoes of cultural condescension and class snobbery that have resonated through this vast canyon are beginning to wane.<BR>
Liberal elites may now begin to probe the depths of their souls for remedies to the deficiencies of 2004. If Democrats take any lesson from the elections, it should be that clarity and conviction always trump nuance.<BR>
Rising from the epicenter of the divide and casting a menacing shadow over American politics is the abortion issue. With President Bush likely to appoint several Supreme Court justices, and subsequent confirmation wars looming on the horizon, Democrats must find a sound and consistent voice on abortion.<BR>
Historically considered a political advantage but lacking accompanying electoral success, the pro-choice party line is beginning to show cracks. Take, for example, this passage from the official 2004 Democratic Party platform:<BR>
"Because we believe in the privacy and equality of women, we stand proudly for a woman's right to choose, consistent with Roe v. Wade, and regardless of her ability to pay. We stand firmly against Republican efforts to undermine that right. At the same time, we strongly support family planning and adoption incentives. Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare."<BR>
Obviously a glib attempt at even-handedness, this particular plank appears to impose abortion upon the populace as an absolute human right to be provided, if need be, at taxpayer expense.<BR>
Unlike abortion, the right to bear arms is specifically enumerated in the constitution. Imagine the hysteria if Republicans adopted the equally radical yet perhaps more legally sound position of providing firearms to all citizens regardless of ability to pay.<BR>
While their extreme position on abortion is a political vulnerability, the crux of the Democrats' dilemma resides in the final, sound bite-friendly sentence: namely, why should the safe and legal exercise of an absolute human right occur only rarely?<BR>
Rationalizing this paradox, until recently, required little more than centrist-sounding lip service from Democrats.<BR>
The popular Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 gave liberals the opportunity to realize their purported desire to rarify the more than 1 million annual abortions in the United States with little accompanying political risk. Yet Senate Democrats opposed the ban 30-17. Among those voting against the ban was the top of the 2004 presidential ticket, Sen. John Kerry.<BR>
Kerry, perhaps, best personifies the difficulty abortion presents for Democrats. Never one to abandon any side of an issue, Kerry suffered irreparable harm fromby his abortion positions. ABC News anchor Peter Jennings asked Kerry in July to square his moral opposition to abortion, coupled with his belief that life begins at conception, with his policy positions.<BR>
Jennings: "If you believe that life begins at conception, is even a first-trimester abortion not murder?"<BR>
Kerry: "No, because it's not the form of life that takes personhood in the terms that we have judged it to be in the past. It's the beginning of life."<BR>
Kerry claimed to be a man of science. Yet, standing firmly on the party platform, he was reduced to amateur theorizing about the infusion of "personhood" into what he admits can only reasonably be human life. Merriam-Webster defines life as "an organismic state characterized by capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction."<BR>
Only in the politicized biological classification of the products of human conception does controversy exist in distinguishing between the living and the inanimate.<BR>
Diminishing in power since 2000, Democrats now stand at a crossroads. A CBS News poll conducted at their national convention found that delegates were twice as likely as Democratic voters to support abortion in all cases. Nevertheless, abortion extremists within the party leadership want no limits on the practice and have since 1973 gradually steered the party to the furthest leftward reaches of the political spectrum.<BR>
Faced with the consolidation of Republican power, Democrats must now either defend the position that abortion is of no more moral significance than an appendectomy and yet among the most fundamental of human rights, or move immediately to assist in reducing its occurrence.<BR>
The choice belongs to them.
Matthew Hicks, a registered nurse and father of four, lives and works in Gainesville.<BR>